


and i hope it feels right (when i'm holding you tight)

by starrydreams



Category: Descendants (2015)
Genre: Angst, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, dw everything is okay at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-11
Updated: 2016-07-11
Packaged: 2018-07-22 23:50:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7458436
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starrydreams/pseuds/starrydreams
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It started off as small, hesitant touches. Brushing shoulders and slaps on the arm. But the contact grew with the two. Arms around shoulders and holding the other when scared (mostly Jay holding Carlos.) Touches linger, and they mean nothing and everything. They, especially, mean everything to Carlos. Not that he would ever say that out loud (maybe he would, to Evie, in private.) Though, at night, he would allow himself to recall the contact from their day, and he would allow his cheeks to turn red, and the tips of his ears to feel warm. He would allow himself to bury his face in his pillow and smile.</p>
<p>Or, the time Jay made a homophobic comment, and it felt like the world was ending.</p>
            </blockquote>





	and i hope it feels right (when i'm holding you tight)

**Author's Note:**

> i died while writing this. like,, it wasn't supposed to be 4k but it just happened

It started off as small, hesitant touches. Brushing shoulders and slaps on the arm. But the contact grew with the two. Arms around shoulders and holding the other when scared (mostly Jay holding Carlos.) Touches linger, and they mean nothing and everything. They, especially, mean everything to Carlos. Not that he would ever say that out loud (maybe he would, to Evie, in private.) Though, at night, he would allow himself to recall the contact from their day, and he would allow his cheeks to turn red, and the tips of his ears to feel warm. He would allow himself to bury his face in his pillow and smile.

Everything went spiraling downhill during a Tourney game, which came as a surprise because everything was going okay. They won the game, and Jay got the winning goal. Carlos had been on the field, much to his dismay, but he hadn’t been terrible. He had done pretty well. Well enough that Ben had given him a nice clap on the shoulder, with an approving nod that accompanied praise on his game play. Even the coach had given him compliments, given they were paired with advice. Words of confirmation, telling him that he was improving. It was nice to know, after all, he was better in the tech and science department rather than the sports department. Though, he had stayed on the team for a certain long haired boy.

(He considered quitting, he even told Jay that. But he was convinced by the other to stay, with a pair of puppy dog eyes that were suddenly his weakness now that he was no longer scared of them. And Jay could pull them off better than Dude could. He was still trying to figure that out.)

Carlos lingered on the field as people started to file out of the bleachers. He hadn’t seen Jay since he scored the goal. The rest of the team probably whisked him away somewhere. He let a small sigh escape his lips, and he turned to head back to the dorm he shared with the only reason he was still on the team. Jay would come back later and probably ask why he hadn’t come with a pout. And the shorter boy would say that he had a machine to work on. He would never say that he didn’t come because the way Jay looked after they won a game made his cheeks pink. It made him want to scream. (Of course he tagged along most of the time. He would be horrible if he didn’t.)

And then everything tipped. Like one of his contraptions short circuited and wouldn’t work again for a few days. That’s probably, exactly, what he was like in the moment.

Later that night he would recount the scene. He would replay it over and over in his head. He would stay up well past midnight, staring at his ceiling, then going to tinker with some parts. It would still be playing in his head, and his ears would turn the brightest shade of red. He wanted to say it happened in a blur. He couldn’t. It was crystal clear in his mind, and it felt so surreal. He doubted it happened at first. It took him a few minutes to come to realize it did actually happen. He was still trying to come to terms with it.

_It all happened it a rather short period of time, but it all felt slowed down. He felt a hand smack his ass. It made him flinch and yelp, but it was a calmest reaction to being hit that he’d had since they left the Isle. Auradon was helping him, and he felt safe with the distance from his mom. There was always the slight panic that it could be her, but it never was. Not anymore._

_He half expected it to be Mal. But then_ his _familiar voice spoke up from beside him, and Carlos felt like he could faint. He turned his head to look at the taller boy, on autopilot. He was shocked, and completely out of it. Had that just happened? Was that an accident? Was it really him?_

_“You did a good job out there,” Jay began and wrapped an arm around his shoulder. “You should come with us for pizza.”  
_

_“C-Can’t,” Carlos squeaked as he found his voice, “I, um, can’t. I’ve got a project I’m working on. Really close to finishing soo..”  
_

_“No, bro, that’s cool. I’ll see you later, then.”  
_

_Jay shook his shoulder lightly before dropping the contact and walking backwards away. And he winked. He fucking_ winked _. The younger of the two lifted his hand in a wave, not being able to respond past that. He was completely unresponsive. A reboot, please._

_As soon as Jay was out of sight, he ran back to the dorm._

That was it, he couldn’t take it anymore. He couldn’t figure out how to get the wires to connect correctly for this one project. He needed a second opinion, Evie’s opinion. She would be able to help him with it. Maybe she could help with the.. incident that happened earlier, too, if he was able to even talk about it. To find the courage and the voice.

He roughly stood up from his chair, which made Dude wake up and give the white haired boy a concerned whine. He gave a reassuring scratch behind the ear in return, whispering that he would be back later. He collected his invention in his arms, picked up other pieces and tools, shoved them in his pockets, and headed to the girls’ room. 2:13 am, his watch read. A perfect time for a surprise visit. Mal would be _ecstatic_. She might even punch his arm because she was just so _excited_.

He was greeted by the purple haired girl when he arrived at the dorm, after knocking about a million times. She stared at him, and he stared at her, until she shut the door in his face. He knocked again, it becoming more of a task with the contraption in his arms. Thankfully, the door opened again, revealing a disheveled Evie. Even with bedhead she was still beautiful. Doug was a lucky guy, and he couldn’t decide if he should be happy, or be a protective (younger) brother. (It was usually the first part. He really was happy that she was happy with him. She deserved to be.)

“I need help with these wires.” Carlos blurted out, before she could ask what was wrong.

“Aw, just like back on the Isle.”

“Yeah, yeah. You gonna help?”

She ushered him inside, and he set the device on the table. They both pulled up a chair and he spilled the contents of his pockets onto the table as well. They began to tinker with it, rearranging wires and adding parts. They worked for about an hour, much to Mal’s complaining. _You guys’ whispering is keeping me up. This is just_ cruel. Both Carlos and Evie ignored her, both silently agreeing it would be small payback for things she did on the Isle. Mal could stand to lose a few hours of sleep.

Eventually the contraption whirred to life, and Carlos cheered, letting out a _whoop!_ that got a pillow thrown at him by the daughter of Maleficent. Evie clapped quietly, a warm smile on her face. She pushed the excess parts and the tools aside, rested her elbow on the table, her chin in hand, and quirked an eyebrow at him. Oh. He didn’t like that look. _It was a I know something’s wrong and you’re going to tell me whether you like it or not_ look.

“So. Are you going to tell me why you were up at two in the morning with one of your projects?”

“I hit a breakthrough..?” It was more of a question, than a statement. It earned him another look and he sighed. “It’s Jay.”

Mal snorted.

“Shut up! We usually do this while you’re asleep!” Carlos groaned.

“Oh, so this is a regular thing?”

Neither him or Evie responded, and instead, she turned to him. “What happened with Jay?”

Carlos’s cheeks flared a bright pink. He wasn’t sure how to word it, and dwelling on it started to make his ears feel hot. Mal looked like she was trying not to laugh, a hand over her mouth. Evie just looked more confused, her eyebrows furrowed a bit.

“I-- um. He--”

“Jay slapped his ass.”

“ _Mal!_ ” It was both of them.

“What? It’s true. That’s what he was going to say.”

Carlos nodded sheepishly, and Evie stared at him, mouth agape.

“And where was I?” She pouted.

“Somewhere with Doug.” Mal answered again.

She suddenly stood up, causing the boy to flinch. She apologized quickly and ushered the purple haired girl out of the room, muttering ‘out out out’ and ‘we can’t do this while you’re in here!’ while Mal muttered ‘okay okay okay jeez!’ He watched as Evie shut the door behind her, and relaxed now that she was gone. He definitely couldn’t talk about this stuff while Mal was in the room. (Not that he didn’t trust her, but he trusted Evie way more. And she would give better advice.)

The blue haired girl sat back down next to him. He rested his head on the table and buried his face in his arms. She rubbed small circles into his back, staying quite. They stayed like that for a few minutes before Carlos spoke up, but stayed hidden. He didn’t want Evie to see how red he was. He probably matched half his wardrobe right now.

“He winked at me, E, he fucking _winked_ at me. Does he even know that he’s doing that?”

“He winked at you?”

Carlos just nodded.

“I still think that you should talk to him. Tell him how you feel? Maybe he will loosen up on all the.. all that.”

“But he’s straight.”

“He slapped your ass and winked at you.”

The son of Cruella sat there, not daring to respond with anything witty. Or anything at all. He hadn’t tried to get his hopes up. He hadn’t tried hoping that Jay just so happened to be gay. (Ha. Rhymes.) Because he knew that he probably wasn’t. That he probably wasn’t bi or anything else either. Knowing that it was okay to be a boy who liked boys was new to him. Auradon was oddly accepting, and Ben had explained the whole thing to him one day. It was sort of scary, and a complete relief, all at once. He was glad he wasn’t alone and that it was a thing, but he was also scared that it was a thing. (What would his mom say? Hopefully he would never have to hear.)

“Yeah, okay, I’ll consider it.” He says after a moment, standing up. He gathered his things and headed towards the door.

Evie got up as well and gave him a hug and words of encouragement. Even Mal told him a short ‘good luck’ as she walked back into the bedroom. She didn’t even seem to be all that upset that they kicked her out of the room and kept her up. Maybe she was starting not to care all that much.

Carlos snuck back to his dorm, setting his things back down on the table. He was quiet, careful not to wake the other. He didn’t feel like being asked about where he was so late. He slunk back to his bed and crawled in next to Dude, who gave him a look, but went back to sleeping. With it being 3:42 am, he shifted his gaze from the dog next to him, to the boy sleeping soundly in the other bed. He looked so peaceful while he slept, his long hair falling in just the right way. His lips were parted just slightly, and he couldn’t help but think how much he wanted to kiss him.

He let out a sigh and shut his eyes.

_Please don’t be straight_ , he silently pleaded.

Things weren’t going as bad as they could be. At least, that’s what Carlos thought. He had somehow convinced himself to ask Jay to join him when he walked Dude later that day. It was just enough time to have a near anxiety attack over what he was going to say. He had gone back to Evie for advice on how to confess and everything. Even the walk was going pretty good. The two brushed shoulders and hands every so often, and it made Carlos’s heart flutter each time. It also made his anxiety spike, and he found himself reciting the periodic table to himself to keep himself walking.

“I can’t believe that.” Jay said suddenly, breaking their silence.

“What?”

“That.” He pointed towards a couple that was headed who knows where.

Carlos’s breath stopped in his throat, and he stopped walking. Just a week ago two princes had hooked up, their parents, Carlos had long forgotten. It didn’t really matter much, though, they were both extremely happy. It had given him a surge of pride, and it made him feel sort of better about himself. To know that there were more people on campus who were like him. It calmed him down a lot, and he wasn’t so scared anymore. (He had privately told them he was happy for them.)

But suddenly he was feeling scared all over again.

He angled his gaze up to Jay’s face, which had a look of disgust on it. (And apparently he had stopped talking too, but he could barely register that.) Just like that, any hope to come out to Jay and confess shattered into a million pieces. Like glass that was dropped from his treehouse. Something that couldn’t be just glued back together and sold again. He felt weak. He felt like he wanted to cry. He forced himself to laugh nervously instead.

“Aha-- I know right? But, uh, I couldn’t get my machine working last night so I’m.. I’m gonna go see if I can. I’ll see you later, bye!”

The words were rushed and he didn’t give the son of Jafar the option to answer or argue. He hurried back to the dorm, carrying Dude rather than letting him run beside him. It was quicker and all he wanted to do was cry for a while. Maybe sleep, and never wake up again. Did Maleficence's staff still have that curse? Maybe her wheel? He would just have to convince Mal to put him in coma, basically. Sleeping for a thousand years didn’t seem so bad.

He shot a pleading text to the girls, asking them to keep Jay out of the dorm for a few hours. They had asked him a lot of questions, about how it went and what he said. He replied with a _I don’t want to talk about it_ , shut his phone off, and flopped down on his bed. He let out a stifled sob, hugging himself. He drew his knees up to his chest and hid his face in them. He let himself cry for way longer than he would’ve on the Isle, before burying his face in a pillow (the one Evie gave him.) Tears flowed until his head started to hurt, and until it was hard to keep his eyes open. They slipped shut as he fell into a sleep that was too light to produce nightmares.

The next couple of days rolled by painfully. Evie and Mal had come to visit him later, pestering him about what happened. He ended up telling them, not even being able to cry anymore. Just stare at Dude dejectedly, and sigh as much as he used to back on the Isle. The blue haired girl comforted him, while the purple haired one looked as if she was ready to yell at Jay. (Which wouldn’t be pretty. You wouldn’t want to get yelled at by Mal. You wouldn’t want to be in the area when she was yelling.) Carlos had to beg her not to, and in the end, it was Evie to convince her to let it be. The two left with comforting words, and he decided to work on a new project. Something for Dude. A mechanical toy? Maybe. Something so that he could walk himself?

He hadn’t even talked to Jay since it happened. He just kept saying that he had to work on his project if the other tried to start conversation. He could hardly even look at him. And it hurt, badly. It hurt not to talk to his second best friend (sorry, Evie took the first position), but looking at him hurt a lot worse. His words kept ringing in his ears late at night, when he was trying to sleep. It kept him up, and he was slowly developing darker bags under his eyes that him and Evie both hated, but he had shrugged off. _At least they match my color scheme_ , he thought. He was slowly learning to live like that, and decided that it was probably how he would live from then on.

Maybe he could talk to those princes...

Carlos was snapped from his thoughts as the door of their room was thrown open to reveal a pretty-pissed-off Jay. His eyes lingered on his chest before they focused their gaze on the science book in his hands. There was Tourney practice, and the son of Cruella didn’t show. He _couldn’t_. Not with Jay looking like _that_. It would be too much and he was trying to get over the other. He was trying really hard.

He heard the other clear his throat and he looked up at Jay, who was now standing in front of him. He made eye contact with him and swallowed. He was sort of failing. Badly.

“Where were you today?” Yep. He was angry. Why didn’t he hide somewhere?

“Here.. Reading.” Carlos gestured to his book.

“Why weren’t you at practice?”

“I was working on--”

“Your project, yeah, I know.” Jay shot a glare and crossed his arms over his chest.

Carlos winced, gripping his book tighter. He didn’t want to talk about it, he didn’t want to tell Jay. He didn’t want Jay confronting him about it. He wanted to hide somewhere. If he went to the two princes, would they hide him? Maybe he could lock himself in their closet. (Ha ha.)

“I’m thinking about quitting the team.”

“What?!”

He shrugged. “I just... I kind of want to focus on science and--”

“What’s been up with you?! You’ve been acting strange ever since that walk we went on! And you’ve only been working on that thing!” Jay pointed at the device.

_Because of your comment on those two guys!_ He wanted to yell, _Because I’ve had a huge crush on you ever since we went to get Maleficent’s staff back! And you made a homophobic comment!_

“You _what?_ ” The long haired boy asked, a look of shock on his face. Apparently he _did_ say it.

Carlos froze, and bolted. It was surprisingly easy to run when you felt like something was chasing you, or you needed to get away from something. He was always shit at sports.

He ran until he started running through trees. He climbed up one, hoisting himself up on a higher up branch. He hugged the trunk, resting his head on it. He felt tears slip down his cheeks and off his chin. He was crying for the second time in a week, over the exact same thing. He ruined it, he knew he did. Jay would never want to talk to him again. He would get Carlos put into another dorm and throw dirty looks at him. Maybe even laugh at him, tease him.

What felt like forever, and a million atomic numbers and electrons later, Carlos was no longer crying. He let his eyes slip shut. He might just fall asleep, right there, in a tree in the forest. He was about to, when he heard footsteps from below. How could someone find him? He didn’t really know where he was himself.

“Go away, Evie.”

“That would be kinda hard, considering she isn’t here.”

The boy genius yelped, eyes flying open at the sound of the only person he didn’t want to see’s voice. Standing below him was Jay, a smirk on his face, and his arms crossed over his chest. He flailed a bit due to shock, but grabbed onto the tree trunk again. He glared down at the don of Jafar, biting his lip.

“What do you want?” He asked harshly, wrapping his arms around the tree tighter.

“Come down from there, tree hugger, you’ve been up there for almost an hour.” He laughed, but then dropped his voice. “And I, uh, I want to talk to you.”

Carlos hesitated. He didn’t want to come down. He didn’t want to talk to him, but if seeing him laugh didn’t make his heart skip a beat, nothing would. So, he slowly climbed down from the tree and stood in front of the taller boy. He straightened his clothes subconsciously.

“Look, Jay, I-I’m sorry--”

“No. You didn’t do anything.” Jay interrupted. “I, um. I was being ignorant. I still had the Isle’s mindset and...” He trailed off, and Carlos nodded knowingly. “And I talked to the girls, and Ben. I think... I think I’m bisexual.” He admitted sheepishly.

“What makes you think that?”

“Because according to all three of them, my feelings for you is a crush.”

Carlos stopped breathing. He blinked and stared at the other for a second. Two, Three. Then he was tugging the collar of Jay’s shirt, pulling him down, and he was meeting him halfway by standing on his tip toes. He felt Jay’s lips on his, frozen, which made him nearly pull away. But then the other responded, snaking his arms around his waist, and pulling him closer. The son of Cruella let his eyes close again, and his hands stayed where they were, a tight trip on Jay. He felt that if he were to let go, the taller boy would slip through his grasp and away from him again.

The kiss wasn’t gentle, not at first. At first it was needy and desperate, glad to finally be doing this. Wanting to do this. But as the two calmed down from their initial shock, the kiss got calmer as well. Sweet and caring. Jay rubbed circles just above Carlos’s hip, under his shirt. Carlos’s arms wrapped around his neck. It was better than he could ever ask for. One of the best things ever to happen to him.

They pulled away from each other, Jay resting his forehead on the smaller boy’s. he flatted out his feet again, no longer needing to be on his tip toes when the other was just leaning down. They stood there in a comfortable silence, just sort of, staring at each other.

“You know, I’ve wanted to do that,” Carlos breathed out, “since we were on the Isle.”

Jay laughed, a grin spreading across his face. It made him feel warm, but not as warm as the kiss made him feel.

“Me too.”

A few more days passed. The two had made it official not too long after the forest kiss. Evie had cheered, Ben had congratulated them, and Mal had smiled. Carlos had been smiling too, ever since the kiss. He was happy. Truly happy. He got to call Jay his boyfriend now, and he couldn’t think of anything else that would make him so happy.

Pda was something that took no time at all getting used to. They were already touching all the time anyway, so hand holding and kisses here and there weren’t much of a problem. Jay was nervous to throw those two in there at first, and Carlos couldn’t blame him. He was nervous too, but then again, he always was nervous.

The two were on a walk, Dude trotting ahead of them on a bright red leash. In Carlos’s other hand was Jay’s, walking in silence. It didn’t bother them much, though. It was early and the two were just too tired to try and come up with conversation. Instead, they just enjoyed each other’s presence, stealing glances and kisses. It was nice, and neither of them would trade it for the world. (Jay said stealing Carlos’s heart was the biggest game he could get. Carlos had shoved him off the bed for that.)

They watched as the two princes made their way across the lawn, smiling and waving at the two villain kids.

They smiled and waved back.

**Author's Note:**

> send me prompts at kanayawait on tumblr !!


End file.
